What is a planetesimal?
A) A rotating cloud of interstellar gases
B) A celestial body that orbits the sun but cannot clear its own neighborhood
C) Rocky material accreted through repeated collisions
D) The core of a star that has gone through a nova
Which scientist developed the idea of continental drift?
A) Isaac Newton
B) Charles Darwin
C) Albert Einstein
D) Alfred Wegener
During hydrolysis, ________ commonly decompose into clay minerals, silica, and
soluble constituents.
A) feldspars
B) halides
C) ferromagnesians
D) carbonates
Along which tectonic boundary are deep-ocean trenches found?
A) Convergent
B) Divergent
C) Transform
Note the impact craters in other areas of this image. Which body in the solar system
(other than Earth) could have had erosion like this in the past?
A) Mars
B) Venus
C) Jupiter
D) Neptune
Which layer of the Earth is the thinnest?
A) Crust
B) Mantle
C) Outer Core
D) Inner Core
What is the definition of a half-life?
A) The parent isotope half of a radiometric dating pair
B) Half the time it takes for the parent isotope to decay to the daughter
C) The time it takes for half of the parent isotope to decay to the daughter
D) Half of the alpha particles necessary to decay at a steady rate
The ________ is a seismic boundary between the crust and the mantle where there is a
dramatic increase in seismic wave velocity.
A) Schrodinger discontinuity
B) Greenschist facies
C) Low-velocity pathway
D) Moho boundary
How does isostatic rebound affect a glacial landscape after the glacier is removed?
A) A depressed crust rises after glacial retreat.
B) Advancing glaciers erode bedrock, which allows rock to spring up.
C) Meltwater streams deposit sediment, severely depressing the landscape.
D) Weight of water forces the crust downward.
Which state would you not expect to contain drumlins, eskers, and kettle lakes?
A) Minnesota
B) New York
C) Kentucky
D) Michigan
What kind of viscosity would flood basalts have?
A) Low viscosity
B) Medium viscosity
C) High viscosity
What kind of stress is deforming this block?
A) Shear
B) Compression
C) Tension
What feature in this image is indicated with arrow X? (Note: it is made of sediments.)
A) Deep-sea fan
B) Accretionary wedge
C) Turbidity current
D) Deep-ocean trench
What does the presence of mudcracks indicate about the paleoenvironment?
A) There was immense pressure placed on these sediments, resulting in stress fractures.
B) There was a current of water flowing in one direction.
C) Waves were lapping on the shoreline of the ocean.
D) There was a wet environment that is drying up.
Which of the following is not part of the Milankovitch Cycle?
A) Precession
B) Obliquity
C) Eccentricity
D) Isostacy
The Navajo Sandstone, such as that exposed at Zion National Park in Utah, is evidence
of a ________ environment during the Jurassic Period in the western United States.
A) beach
B) continental shelf
C) lacustrine
D) desert
Most mountain ranges are the result of ________ stress.
A) Compressional
B) Tensional
C) Shear
What is the sedimentary texture displayed in this image?
A) Clay-sized
B) Crystalline
C) Microcrystalline
D) Angular
What is a yardang?
A) A wind-sculpted landform oriented parallel to the prevailing wind, often narrow at
the base
B) A small rock polished and pitted on the exposed surface
C) A shallow depression created by deflation
D) A pit worn into a rock by circular currents of flowing water
Generally speaking, which seismic waves will have the greatest amplitude on a
seismogram?
A) P waves
B) S waves
C) Surface waves
The ________ of a continent consists of Precambrian rocks of the craton covered by a
thin mantle of sedimentary rocks.
A) shield
B) platform
C) rift zone
D) plateau
________ are materials that are good indicators of the metamorphic environment in
which they formed and can be used to distinguish between various zones of
metamorphism.
A) Index fossils
B) Index minerals
C) Blueschists
D) Aureoles
Match the seafloor terms to their correct definitions.
A) Flat seafloor in the deep ocean
B) Wedge of sediments deposited by turbidity currents that formed at the base of the
slope
C) Narrow creases in the seafloor that result from subduction
D) Gently sloping, submerged extension of the continent
E) A steep incline that marks the boundary between the continental crust and the
oceanic crust
1. Continental shelf
2. Abyssal plain
3. Submarine trench
4. Continental rise
5. Continental slope
What is the average rate of temperature increase in the mantle?
A) 0.3C/km
B) 0.7C/km
C) 1C/km
D) 1.3C/km
Under which conditions will a wave be considered a deepwater wave?
A) Wavelength > 1/2 water depth
B) Wave height > water depth
C) Wavelength > 1/2 wave height
D) Water depth > 1/2 wavelength
Which plate boundary along the Circum-Pacific Belt is responsible for the majority of
that belt’s earthquakes?
A) Convergent
B) Divergent
C) Transform
Because of the original molten state of Earth, it is likely that the first crust was
________ in composition.
A) ultramafic
B) mafic
C) intermediate
D) felsic
When the continents were assembled and mountain ranges were matched up, mountains
in Scandinavia and the British Isles matched up perfectly with which North American
mountain range?
A) Rocky Mountains
B) Appalachian Mountains
C) Sierra Nevada Mountains
D) Olympic Mountains
Why do seismic waves follow strongly curved paths as they move through the interior?
A) Their paths are altered by changes in temperature.
B) Their paths are altered by reflection off dense materials.
C) Their velocities are altered by changes in chemistry.
D) Their velocities are changed because of increasing pressure with depth.
Which of the following materials or features are not found at mid-ocean ridges?
A) Basaltic lava eruptions emitted along the ridge
B) Stands higher above the surrounding seafloor
C) Deep submarine trenches
D) Thin layers of sediments
What geologic feature is present in this image?
Explain how the intrusive igneous rock granite can be broken down from a crystalline
igneous rock to a sediment and then finally become a sedimentary rock.
Why are tropical rainforest soils poor for farming?
Is there data to suggest there was more accretion in the distant past (4 billion years ago)
or the more recent past (50 million years ago)? Explain.
Explain the role that confining pressure has on rock strength and how the rock deforms
under pressure.
Explain why waves will begin to curl and fall over as they approach shore.
Which has a higher porosity: sand or sandstone? Why?
A cemetery in New England contains headstones from the seventeenth to the
twenty-first centuries. Headstones from the seventeenth century are made of slate.
Headstones from the mid-nineteenth century are made of marble. The information on
the seventeenth-century headstone is clear and easy to read, whereas the
nineteenth-century headstone is now illegible. Why? What weathering has occurred?
If there is no compositional difference between two oceanic plates, what other factor
will determine which plate will become the subducted one and why? (What other factor
can control density?)
Based on the eruptive materials, volcanic hazards, and violence of eruptions, which
type of volcano would be the most dangerous to live near? Cite specific hazards and
how they could affect nearby residents.
Follow the geothermal gradient to the depth of 100 km. In which state of matter will
peridotite exist at 100 km?
When studying sedimentary rocks, it is important to understand their environment of
deposition. What is the environment of deposition and how can it contribute
information about the geologic history of the rock?
Scenario: In the pursuit of scientific knowledge, you decide to
bore a hole into the crust to see how the temperature
changes. You start your borehole in Davenport, Iowa, where
the geothermal gradient is 20C/km.
Refer to the scenario above. How does this gradient compare to the average geothermal
gradient?
What role did the creation of the ozone layer have in the distribution of life forms
across the planet and why?
Magmas in the magma chamber of a volcano are often compared to soda to explain how
the magma is erupted. How is magma like a bottle of soda? What happens to both
substances when the pressure changes?
The two branches of Bowen’s reaction series are the continuous series and the
discontinuous series. In what ways do the minerals in the discontinuous series differ
from each other? And the minerals in the continuous series?